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Do you wish to join a high-level research team with a friendly atmosphere? And would you like to work jointly on an innovative multidisciplinary project spanning the fields of historical demography, medical history and historical epidemiology? Then you have a part to play as a postdoctoral researcher. This project aims to understand the substantial improvements in life expectancy prior to the 1930s, which caused the burden of disease to lift.
This postdoctoral job opportunity is part of a project called ‘Lifting the Burden of Disease. The Modernisation of Health in the Netherlands: Amsterdam 1854-1926’. This project aims to understand the substantial improvements in life expectancy prior to the 1930s as a result of the decline of infectious diseases, and the principal determinants driving this development, based on individual-level cause-of-death registers for the city of Amsterdam between 1854 and 1926. The project has a multidisciplinary perspective, situated at the interface between infectious disease dynamics and historical demography. The project is executed in cooperation with the Leiden University Medical Centre and the National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM).
Three postdoctoral researchers will work on this project, each focusing on one of three arenas in which the effects of mortality determinants are played out: 1) the urban disease environment, 2) life course and the family, and 3) the physical urban environment at the neighbourhood and street level. For a full description of the project, please contact the project leader Prof. A. Janssens.
You will work on subproject 3: Lifting the burden of disease: a spatial analysis of infectious diseases. You will work closely with the project leaders and the other two postdocs on the team.
Your postdoctoral research will assess the changing interaction between diseases and 19th-century urban space, and how these spatial patterns reveal the effects of determinants of mortality due to infectious diseases.
You will have three main tasks within the project:
1) To apply GIS techniques for different age groups and diseases to reveal clusters of high and low mortality areas, and to conduct spatial regression to assess the impact of environmental and socio-economic factors on spatial patterns in mortality.
2) To collect additional archival material and data from the Amsterdam city archive and other Dutch source material.
3) To produce spatial tools for valorisation goals, such as an exhibition, in close cooperation with other members of the project team.
You will contribute research results to the project's database. You will present research results in at least one major article in an international scientific journal. Furthermore, you will cooperate closely with the project leaders and the other two postdoctoral researchers and participate in the project's programme as a speaker and organiser.
Fixed-term contract: You will be appointed on a fixed-term contract for the maximum duration of 17 months until 31 January 2024 with a trial period of 2 months.
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